Russian Roulette
by Sparky She-Demon
Summary: This time, the case is personal for Joan.


**Chapter 1**

**A/N: Thanks to springfieldbluebird, this got revived. This is a revamp of an old fic of mine, I hope people like my offering. CMW2 came up with the title.**

* * *

New York City, somewhere in Brooklyn, 23:45

Jake Gregory was running late coming back to Saint Olga's Orphanage. He'd been there since he was about six. Whenever families had come to visit, they'd shied away from adopting him, because he was too old in their eyes. When he realized that he wasn't going to be adopted by about the time he was ten, he figured that he might as well make the best of it. He also made a friend, Kaitrina Murray also shunted to the side of being adopted because the families wanted younger kids, kids that had no memory of their birth parents and could be molded better into a different setting.

Now at seventeen, Jake was a senior at the local public school along with Kaitrina. Normally, they would be at the school at the orphanage but since the two of them were smarter than the average student and they had impressed the Trevelyans, a huge benefactor of the orphanage, they were put in one of the upper crust public schools. Kids from that school went to the Ivy League. But something about Kaiti irritated the Trevelyans: She wanted to go to school to become a cop. They saw it as wasted potential. But they were more than pleased with him. In fact, he was dating their seventeen year old daughter Svetlana. Their daughter had blond hair and grey eyes. She was beautiful. He couldn't believe that she was interested in him, an orphan with no money.

There was only one crack in the image of perfection. Lana and Kaiti absolutely detested each other. They couldn't be in the same room together without some sort of incident happening. Kaiti once called her сука. He could tell that it had been definitely negative by the way Lana slapped Kaiti. His friend, not to be outdone, gave her a Maureen O'Hara esque haymaker. Father Vladimir and Lana's father had been the only ones that were able to separate them. When asked what the fight was about, Kaiti had said that she'd caught Lana looking through and copying right out of the notebook in which she was writing her spy story which she had promptly snatched away from her and destroyed the copy that was being made. Lana said that it was absurd that she would do such a thing; in fact, she had suggested that the reason the fight broke out was that Kaiti was jealous of the relationship that she had with him, that she wanted to be his girlfriend. He thought,

_"That's absurd. Kaiti and I had a chance to become more than best friends, but we decided that we valued our friendship over any possibly that we could become more than that. Lana's almost become more trouble than she's worth. Yes, she's pretty and rich, but she has nothing in common with me."_

Just as he was about to turn onto the road that would take him back to Saint Olga's he heard raised voices coming from one of the out buildings. He recognized both voices, one of them being Victor Trevelyan's, the other being Ivan Dashkov's, Lana's uncle on her mother's side. They were speaking in Russian. He had a recorder on him, so he turned it on as he got close enough to hear the words. He'd have Kaiti translate them later.

"Durak! Vy budete delatʹotgruzku devochek vnedelyu. Mne vse ravno, yesli by vlasti s podozreniem. U menya yestʹmnogo deneg, vlozhennykh v eto."

"Eto vse, chto vy vlozhili? Razve vy ne planiruete imetʹ, chto korichnevye volosy amerikanskoĭ devushke, chto vasha dochʹ kulakami ischeznutʹ?"

"YA khotel by bytʹ v sostoyanii sdelatʹ eto, no yestʹnebolʹshaya problema. Pomnite, chto programma nastavnichestva, chto ya sponsor?"

When Jake heard Kaiti's name, he started a little. Ever since she'd told the Trevelyans that she wanted to be a cop, they'd kind of had a falling out. They saw that as a waste of potential. And he didn't like what he heard. He didn't know Russian, but he knew the tone. He had to get back to St. Olga's. He then heard Ivan speak, this time in English.

"Brother, Dimitri just told me something interesting. Apparently there is a teenage boy outside listening to every word we say."

Jake jumped up and tried to run. But no sooner did her stand up, he was surrounded by thugs. As they pushed a black sac over his face, his last thought was as they dragged him to the basement,

_"Kaiti, I'm going to miss you"_

* * *

0745 same back alley…

Officer Ellroy was just ending his beat. Even though he was a rookie, the area around the orphanage was pretty quiet. Pretty surprising, for a place full of kids with no family.

Just as he was about to radio in, he noticed something sticking out from behind a dumpster, looking like a…

"Holy Crap!" Once he calmed down enough, he called it in.

"Officer Ellroy at 52nd and Royal, a 347, repeat a 347!"

Ellroy, after he'd moved the dumpster, went into the first garbage receptacle by the park, and threw up everything he'd eaten.

Holmes was already awake when Joan came downstairs. He had made coffee for Joan and was sitting in the middle of their floor, already at work on his cold case file, as he'd been the past few days. Their most recent case, another one that had come from his file, had spurred him on to work on some of these older cases while he was waiting on their next call from Gregson.

"Good morning, Holmes." She said as she scrubbed a sleepy face with both hands.

"Watson." He replied in greeting, shuffling a stack of notes and placing them back in their box.

"You're working already? It's just 7:30." She yawned and shuffled into the kitchen. "We should take a day off sometime. Visit a museum or have a picnic."

"Picnics are boring." Holmes replied. "A museum visit might have promise, however."

"Okay." She smiled as she took a sip from her mug. "Mmm. Thanks for the coffee."

"Of course." Suddenly his cell phone rang. He reached behind a box and plucked it from a pile of papers. "Holmes." He said, listening intently. The voice on the other end spoke for several moments, then the detective replied, "I'll be there presently." He ended the call and turned to Watson. "Museum will have to wait. Gregson." The glimmer in his eyes told the whole story. "Ready in ten?" He asked her, eager to be off.

She made a face and took a last sip of coffee. "Ten minutes." She rolled her eyes. "You're lucky I'm not high maintenance." She shot at him as she headed upstairs to change.

* * *

Kaitrina Murray loved walking around the area where the orphanage was. There was a park nearby and she would usually go there to write. It was usually noisy where she lived, and since she was one of the older kids; she had more freedom to go out unsupervised. This was something she relished. Today however, she was worried. Her best friend Jake hadn't come back to Saint Olga's last night. Even though it had been a Friday night, he always came back.

They had argued. About the Trevelyans; specifically Svetlana Trevelyan. She had said that she was only dating him to please her family. She had a "real" boyfriend at school. That had led to them both saying things they probably should not have said to each other. She'd left him where he'd been standing. They always made up after their fights and became even closer. She was actually looking forward to talking to Jake again.

As she rounded the corner, she saw police cars and some lights flashing.

_"What the hell is going on?"_ was her thought as she crept closer.

As she did that, she heard a familiar voice. It was close by. Close enough to hear if she called out.

Her eyes widened. What was Joan Watson doing here? The last time she had talked to her friend and mentor was when Joan had texted her and told her she wouldn't be around to the orphanage for a few weeks because of work.

Her friend, who was a doctor, had worked as a sort of volunteer doctor at the orphanage. Now she was a counselor to people who were fresh out of drug rehab. Kaiti could see how Joan would be good at that. She was a great listener, who always offered a friendly ear when Kate had a problem or just needed to talk. Now she seemed to be standing just outside the yellow police line, looking toward a dumpster where the police were congregated.

"Joan?" Kate walked up to her, thinking that she must have been on her way to the orphanage and stopped to see what had happened here. "Hi. What's going on?"

Joan looked surprised when she turned to hear Kaiti's voice. "Kate. Hi." She glanced around, then pulled Kaiti to the side; away from a man talking to what was obviously a police detective. She seemed a little nervous, Kate thought, but she attributed that to the accident or whatever had happened back there. "You probably should go back to St. …"

Before she could go on, the handsome man talking to the tired-looking police detective came over. "Watson—I've just talked to Gregson and…" He stopped when he seemed to recognize that there was a connection between Watson, and the young girl. He studied them a moment as Watson took control of the introductions.

"Kaiti, this is a friend of mine, Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock, this is Katrina Murray. She lives at St. Olga's." She looked at Sherlock, widening her eyes in a meaningful way that said -_Be nice._

Sherlock nodded. "Nice to meet you."

"Yeah. I've not met many of Joan's 'friends.'" Kate grinned at the attractive man with the British accent. She turned to Joan and widened her eyes as Sherlock's gaze went to the small gathering of police behind the yellow line. "This one's hot!" She whispered to Joan, who looked absolutely horrified and shook her head.

Sherlock's eyes snapped back to the conversation, and he raised an eyebrow, about to remark. Watson was blushing furiously. Suddenly another police officer came up to Gregson. The older detective motioned to Holmes and Watson to join them. Kaiti listened in.

"What's the description on the vic?" Gregson asked.

"White male, age 15-20, with dark blond hair. Most of the body is mutilated except for the face and back. Has a tattoo of a sword on his right shoulder blade."

While Gregson was talking with the younger officer, Holmes noticed that Kate's face was getting paler and paler. When it looked like she might faint, he spoke: "You know this victim." It was a statement, not a question.

This got Gregson and Watson's attention. Kate managed to find her voice to ask,

"Is there a scar on the back of the victim's left shoulder?"

The detective, also looking on, checked through his notes. He nodded.

The expression on her face was one of deep anguish. She looked like she'd been punched in the gut and her heart ripped out of her chest. Joan was also noticing this; she then realized who it was.

"Oh God Kaiti, I'm so sorry."

Holmes then asked, "What's the victim's name?"

Kaiti was visibly trying to keep from sobbing. He'd been the only constant in her entire life. When she got a hold of herself momentarily, she said,

"It's Jake Gregory. He's been my best friend for as long as I can remember. He was always there for me."

Joan and Holmes looked at each other. This case had just become personal.


End file.
